Babeorella

It has not been that long since Apple purged some of the risque games from the App Store. While the lovingly-rendered lead character in Doublesix’s Babeorella always stays fully clothed, her jiggling brand of sexiness is at least as ‘adult’ as Daisy Mae’s Alien Buffet. But Babeorella better hope Apple does not clamp down again because without its style, this is just an average arena brawler. Actually, it is still that, even with the style.

Babeorella quickly establishes its trashy, pulpy aesthetics with an opening panel explaining the space heroine’s predicament. According to the game, even in other galaxies women are bad drivers. Like all good exploitation (Blacula, Vampirella), you will laugh for a moment, groan the next, and ultimately feel sort of bad about the whole ordeal. By the time Babeorella starts saying ‘Daddio’ and encouraging you to go from ‘soft’ to ‘hard’ difficulty, you will know what you are in for and whether or not you are on board.

As flexible as a yoga instructor.

The point of the game is to survive an attack from an endless robot horde for as long as you can. The more waves you conquer, the more difficult it gets. Babeorella has dashes and a defensive shield, as well as a plethora of weapons at her disposable. The game smartly chooses which ones you have access to based on the distance between you and your target. Whips, cannon, lasers and bimbo bombs all come into play. Luck and high scores can lead to health upgrades, size-boosting power-ups and even an invincibility shield.

The problem is that, while the nature of the game requires doing the same thing often, there is not enough freshness to turn the repetition into addiction. Babeorella herself looks fine, as do her colorful weapons but the five respawning enemies she constantly fights on top of the one asteroid are a bore to look at. A few more distinct enemies and another arena or two would have gone along way toward making this feel like a more complete package.

Some serious stripper stagecraft.

It is not like there is one glaring flaw in Babeorella. It controls fine, the polygonal graphics are pretty decent, the psychedelic menus are cool, and at least it promises downloadable content coming in the future. There is a fairly expansive stat-tracking system and the soundtrack is awesome, conjuring images of UFO invasion movies. We are not saying that the fast, arcade action that constitutes the gameplay is bad, either. Far from it, it is quite fun, especially due to the variety of Babeorella’s arsenal, which may been enough for some people.

The problem is that the game just doesn’t go anywhere. If you download it, play a round, see how far you get, and take a break. Otherwise, if you push the game to its limits, you will quickly burn out and discover all the game has to offer, leaving you disappointed.

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